


i'm so delicate when you're around

by procrastinatingbookworm



Series: Hello, I'm good for nothing - will you love me just the same? [20]
Category: Hollow Knight (Video Games)
Genre: Chronic Illness, Chronic Pain, Communication Failure, Depression, Dissociation, Eavesdropping, Gen, Internal Monologue, Other, Physical Disability, Suicidal Thoughts, idk this one got away from me, incompatible disabilties, vaguely referenced mind control/mind alteration
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:15:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28144455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/procrastinatingbookworm/pseuds/procrastinatingbookworm
Summary: A series of unfortunate events leave Quirrel off-balance.
Relationships: Hornet & Quirrel (Hollow Knight), Hornet & The Knight (Hollow Knight), Minor or Background Relationship(s), The Knight & Quirrel (Hollow Knight)
Series: Hello, I'm good for nothing - will you love me just the same? [20]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1957039
Comments: 16
Kudos: 64





	i'm so delicate when you're around

**Author's Note:**

> this one is... rough. quirrel has a chronic pain flare-up, coinciding with some unfortunately placed Plot(tm) and a canon-typical lack of communication, resulting in a very not fun series of events.
> 
> if you need to skip this fic, it'll be summarized in the notes of #22, when that goes up.

Quirrel knows that he can’t keep up with Ghost.

He’s always known that, as far back as the second or third time they encountered one another. They simply outpace him. Wherever they draw their energy from—rest or soul or something they consume—it replenishes them more quickly than Quirrel could hope to match. 

Quirrel can love them all he wants. He still won’t be able to keep up with them. He aches too much, down to his joints. Down to his soul.

That’s fine with him. It’s honor enough that Ghost ever deigns to stop by his side. He’d never think to ask them to slow down for his sake.

Not even now. Not even now that there’s time, if they wished to take it—if Quirrel wished to ask for it. The air still smells of rot and decay, but not of the Infection’s sickly sweetness. There’s no fast-approaching point of no return, not that Quirrel knows of.

There still isn’t any chance that they’ll stop. 

It’s the only time they seem at peace, when they’re running. They don’t stare at their map as though something unfathomable is wrong with it, they don’t struggle with their signs or stand painfully still with their fists opening and closing, they don’t slam their nail against solid walls so hard the knockback makes them stumble.

They just run.

So it doesn’t matter if Quirrel can’t keep up. He’d rather see them running and be left behind than have them suffer for his sake.

He’s happy with his slower pace.

Far ahead of him, nearly out of sight, Ghost darts through the foliage of Greenpath, a soft, strange glow among the foliage.

They didn’t tell Quirrel or Hornet where they planned to go; just glanced at their map and set off at a run, intent on some goal that their companions aren’t privy to.

(Hornet keeps her hand in Quirrel’s, never letting him be left behind entirely. Maybe she’s tired too, or maybe she just wants to stay close to him. Quirrel isn’t sure which would make the ache worse, so he lets it go unpondered, unasked.)

Ghost stops, jarringly—from mid-step to stock-still in an instant. They turn and look back, eyes dark in their pale face, as if ensuring that Quirrel and Hornet aren’t too far behind.

Then they’re running again.

They don’t even slow down as they hit the edge of the drop, falling out of view.

Quirrel feels like his soul has been jerked right out of his body. His vision tilts, doubles, fuzzes over.

He thinks, distantly, that he hears the gentle sound of water.

As if she can hear his thoughts, Hornet squeezes his hand. Her thumb traces over the back of his claw.

“I suppose this is fitting—I had them chasing me for a while,” she says. She squeezes again, tighter, almost enough to pull Quirrel back to himself. “Come on. We’ll never accomplish anything if we keep having to stop and calm each other down.”

That makes Quirrel laugh, at least, and unlocks his shaking legs enough to move forward, to the edge of the drop-off.

It’s going to hurt.

(What doesn’t hurt, at this point?)

Before he can jump down, Hornet’s needle whistles past his head, anchoring itself in the wall.

“Because this went so well last time,” Quirrel teases, but he steps into Hornet’s arms when she opens them to him.

“I’ll be careful,” Hornet promises, stepping fearlessly into the gap, pulling Quirrel along with her.

Quirrel’s weight still unbalances their descent, as he expected, but neither of them fall, this time. They land on their feet. Hornet tugs her nail from the wall—catches it as it falls, spins it, sheathes it. 

Ghost is waiting. 

They hop up and down, and lead Quirrel and Hornet into a room.

For a vicious moment, Quirrel’s mind glazes over with fury. He feels mocked,  _ cornered. _ His whole body twinges and shakes just  _ imagining _ traversing either of the ways through the room.

He could. He could leap across the acid pools and cling to the vertical walls—he could climb the array of vines on the wall to his left and crawl through the narrow space running above the thorns-and-acid  _ mess _ . He could. It would hurt, but he could.

Instead, Quirrel shuts his eyes, breathing deeply. He rocks back and forth on his feet, feeling the pain lance up through his legs, grounding in the way it sears, and drops Hornet’s hand.

“I think you should go on ahead,” he says when he opens his eyes, as evenly as he can manage around the anger flaring up in his throat. “That doesn’t seem like a trek I’ll enjoy at all.”

Ghost tilts their head. They point up, at the crawl space.

“Ghost,” Hornet says, and Quirrel thinks he might cry from relief. “If he wants to stay here, let him. I’m sure we can accomplish whatever it is you need in this room with just the two of us.”

Ghost’s expression doesn’t change, but their shoulders slump. Quirrel feels a pang of regret, but he’s made his choice.

He sits down heavily, leans his nail against the wall, and watches them disappear upwards.

When they’re out of sight, he shuts his eyes. Rustling leaves, Hornet’s voice muffled by distance, minute splashes of the acid, singing.

Singing?

No, not quite singing. Something more distant than that, less like a voice and more like the wind that blew Quirrel back into Hallownest.

More like Monomon, in her tank. More like the scream from inside the Black Egg Temple. Rough on the edges. Unhappy, discontent. Calling out for help.

Quirrel is walking before he’s thinking. There’s pain, but it doesn’t quite occur to him to acknowledge it. Something’s calling to him, and he wants to find it.

(Because that’s always worked out so well for him before, hasn’t it.)

He climbs and walks and even crawls in a few places, following the song that isn’t quite a song.

Quirrel’s nearly to the Temple of Unn before he realizes there’s someone sitting on the pier.

He reaches for his nail on instinct, but it’s not there—he must have left it when he started to follow the singing.

The song stops, and Quirrel’s head clears. He backs up, uncertain, and then the bug on the pier speaks.

The voice is harsh and jagged, rasping out of the bugs throat, subdued and obviously pained. 

“Unn,” the bug says. “Unn, darling, I really hope you’re listening.”

Abruptly, Quirrel recognizes him. He’s the Troupe Master, Grimm—the bug who showed up when the Temple broke open and pulled rationale from the wreckage.

Somehow, he sounds  _ worse _ than he did then. Less like he’s ill and more like he’s  _ dying. _

“You know I don’t like to ask too much…” a ragged laugh. “...but I need you. I need your help. I won’t last as long as she needs me for—” a wheezing inhale that sounds like shards of glass. Quirrel’s throat aches in sympathy. “The vessel—Ghost—showed me your charm, I know you’re paying some attention,  _ please—!” _

Grimm’s voice breaks, choked with more than whatever’s killing him, and Quirrel realizes that he shouldn’t be here. The call wasn’t for him, and by following it he’s intruded.

Going back is harder—the pain is sharper and surer, and Quirrel’s head spins with shame.

And that’s before he hears the arguing.

He hears it from rooms away. Hornet’s voice, and two others that he recognizes faintly, and it makes his whole body twinge.

It’s worse, when he actually reaches the room. 

Ghost is signing in huge, sweeping, vicious movements, hands shaking despite the surety of their words, mask streaked with dark tears. Hornet is holding Quirrel’s nail in two of her hands and  _ shouting _ , in a cracked shard of a voice that makes Quirrel want to drown himself.

There are two others. The Nailsmith from the City of Tears, and a bug in a paint-splattered apron. They’re the only ones to look up when he arrives, and it takes them long, agonizing moments to get Hornet’s attention away from her argument with Ghost long enough to see him.

Quirrel expects her to hit him. He’d hit  _ himself _ , for a stunt like that, and she certainly seems to be gearing up for it, the way she moves toward him, but she doesn’t.

She just shoves his nail into his chest and pushes past him. “We’re going home,” she snaps. “Make your excuses later.”

Quirrel shuts his mouth, swallows his words, and follows her out.

_ Rough start, _ he hears the Nailsmith say from behind him, low enough that it must have only been meant for the artist.

It should be funny. It would be funny, if Quirrel didn’t feel sick.

**Author's Note:**

> like i did with the last milestone, i'm going to pivot plot focus for the next set of ten fics. there might be a gap in uploading as i plan around current developments. this fic wasn't as neat a bow as i planned it to be.
> 
> happy hanukkah and happy other holidays, good luck with midterms/finals/etc. and stay safe!


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